Is this possible??

[Richard Pask]

Is it really possible that a band called 'The Checkers', from Alberta recorded an instrumental called 'Chinook'!? (1961)

Go on You tube and check it out: I can't believe it!

[chipschap]

That one is quite a coincidence, or maybe a foreshadowing, as a fiction writer might put it.

It is at least mildly surprising, though, how many things have "checkers" in the name, ranging from the well-known Checker cabs, a Checkers fast food chain, Checkers chewing gum, and countless more; there's even a "Checkers" bridal shop in Pennsylvania. (The latter, alas, didn't want to be featured in a Checker Maven story.)

[George Hay]

Chinook, of course, is the groundbreaking Checkers Computer Program developed at the University of Alberta, about 30 years later!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smltHSOo0bk

[Richard Pask]

The fact that the band come from Alberta - of course Chinook was 'born' in the University of Alberta - leaves me speechless too!

[chipschap]

It's not at all surprising that an Alberta band would record a piece called "Chinook." Neither is it surprising that the checker program was called "Chinook." After all "Chinook Winds" are a well-known feature of Alberta weather --- they are the winds that come off the mountains in winter, often breaking up an intense cold spell.

The amazing foreshadowing is that the band was called "Checkers."

[Richard Pask]

Bob, you are of course, quite right: it's not quite as odd as I thought.

I further note, however, that one of the band members is called Denny.

If only the other three had been called Kelso, Dundee and Bristol!

[Bill Salot]

Were any of the band members named Ed, as in Edinburgh?

[George Hay]

Good question, Bill. The Checkers were a quartet with Denny Goshimon on lead guitar, Jerry Arnold on rhythm guitar, Wes Kucheran on bass guitar, and Gary Fabbi on the drums. The line up can be confirmed by this link to a 2014 article from Cashbox Canada about the Checkers band.

http://www.cashboxcanada.ca/5305/checke ... gacy-award